The Sundance Institute just announced their annual showcase of new independent film work, the Sundance Film Festival, will take place once again in 2022.
Selections across the Feature Film, Indie Episodic, and New Frontier categories will screen in Park City, Salt Lake City and the Sundance Mountain Resort in Utah, and digitally an enhanced online platform at Festival.Sundance.org.
Film enthusiasts who prefer the big screen experience but can’t quite make it to Utah can also catch the films in person at seven Satellite Screens venues around the country during the Festival’s second weekend.
Films featuring some of our favorite stars, including Regina Hall, Keke Palmer, Sterling K. Brown, Thandiwe Newton, and Kanye West to name a few will all be featured, alongside selections from up-and-coming artists in the film production, directing, and acting space.
The full slate of works announced today includes 82 feature-length films representing 28 countries, and 39 of 92 (42%) feature film directors are first-time feature filmmakers. Fifteen of the feature films and projects announced today were supported by Sundance Institute in development through direct granting or residency labs.
Seventy-five, or 91%, of the Festival’s feature films announced today will be world premieres.
“This year, we look forward to celebrating this generation’s most innovative storytellers as they share their work across a wide range of genres and forms,” said Sundance Institute founder and president Robert Redford. “These artists have provided a light through the darkest of times, and we look forward to welcoming their unique visions out into the world and experiencing them together.”
Notable selections include Alice, director and screenwriter Krysten Ver Linden’s film starring KeKe Palmer and Common. It tells the wild-yet-true story of a slave in 1800s Georgia who escapes her plantation…only to discover that it’s 1973 and slavery has been outlawed for over 100 years.
Also featured is jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy, a documentary from director/producers Clarence “Coodie” Simmons and Chike Ozahwhich that details over 20 years of Kanye West’s personal and professional life.
Regina Hall appears in two of this year’s selections. Honk for Jesus, Save Your Soul, sees her as the first lady of a prominent Southern Baptist megachurch, attempting to help her pastor husband rebuild their congregation after a scandal. Master finds her navigating a supernaturally-powered force of racism haunting the Ivy-League campus.
Another standout is We Need to Talk About Cosby from director Kamau Bell, who examines the concept of “separating the art from the artist” in the case of intense scandal criminal activity attached to America’s once-favorite TV dad.
The Festival takes place January 20–30, 2022. Ticket packages go on sale on December 17 at 10 am MT and single film tickets go on sale on January 6 at 10 am MT. See more of this year’s selections HERE.